I saw the title of an article on some sales blog a few weeks back that it has taken me that long to process just how ridiculous it was. No exaggeration, the article was titled something like "167 Tips For Best Goal Setting."
So many problems with this. I don't think you can have 167 tips for anything, even sex, without contradicting yourself somewhere along the way. If a salesperson spends to reading, let alone trying to implement, 167 different actions, there is no way he will have time to actually accomplish anything.
We've all heard the top eight tips golden rules for goal-setting, and with just these few tips you can be a higher achiever than the masses. If you are new to sales let me run through them for you really quick.
1) Write Goals Down
2) Make Goals Attainable
3) Make Goals Challenging
4) Look At Goals Daily
5) Prioritize Goals
6) Make An Action Plan
7) Track & Adjust Action Taken Toward Reaching Goals
8) Celebrate Milestones
I think these are minimum requirements for good goal-setting, but you are not 159 tips from really getting it right. I have adopted two higher level habits in regards to my goal-setting that only help me reach my goals more often, but make it almost impossible for me to not at least come extremely close to hitting them time after time. These two habits have worked for me with both business and personal goals.
1) Share Your Goals With Other People
This one is not as easy as it sounds, which is why it is so effect. When you set a goal, it must be based on your situation, your skill, and your true desires. Otherwise, it will not succeed. That being the case, when it comes time to share your goals with a co-worker, boss, or someone in your personal life - whoever you believe will support you and hold you accountable the goal - there can be lots of fear that they may not believe in your goals. I have had plenty of people in my life who have told my goals were too far-reaching, told me I was a dreamer and need to come back down to reality. There is always the fear, too, that someone who understands your industry and your end-game will believe your goals are too small, that what you are trying to achieve is meaningless. All of this feedback can be helpful, but the key is finding someone who believes in your goals the same way you do and will not let you come up short on them. If I tell my wife that my goal is to make $100,000 in a year, she will never say out loud that she is disappointed in me if I only made $4,000 in a given month, but you can sure as hell bet that I would be ashamed for her to find out that I didn't even reach have of the goal I set for the month. Having someone who truly understands the process behind reaching goals in your industry can be vitally important to tracking goals along the way. For many of you that is going to be a co-worker or a boss, but for me that is my wife as well. She has learned the ideas behind how I set and track my goals, using a formula that basically says whatever I have out through the end of the day on the 19th day of a 31-day month, I should be able to double. If on the morning of the 20th, I tell her I have 11 cars out, she knows I'm right on pace for 22 cars. She also knows that if I have 15 cars on the board by the 20th that I may hit my goal early and we might be able to have a family day at the end of the month if I'm not busy with a last-minute push. These kid of interaction has been a huge key to my success the last 3 years.
2) Base Your Goals On Past Performance
If you have been in your position, and in generally your industry, for a while, it is pretty easy to track month-to-month progress and year-over-year progress. I fully subscribe to the idea that if you are not moving forward you are falling behind. If you sold last 12 cars last December, it is your responsibility to find some way to sell even one more this December. Do that every month, and you are likely looking at giving yourself an easy $4,000 ranger year-over-year.
If you are new to sales, your industry, or your company, there are still ways to figure this out. Take a look at current performance in your dealership. If the average salesperson is selling 10 cars, and the top guy in the place is selling 25, it is highly unlikely that you are going to jump right in and sell 30 cars a month. To make that a goal can lead to a very discouraging start. That's not to say don't try to sell 30, but the right goal is based off of past performance so if you want to be bold enough to say that you are going to go right in and be the top guy and sell 26 cars go for it, but I would typically look at a situation where 12 guys are averaging 10 cars a month and so OK, that's 120 cars per month. 120/13 is 9.23 so I likely set my initial goal at around 11. In a case like my current dealership starts paying bonuses at 13 units, I probably make that my goal. If you come right out and do 17, you know you are on the right track and start finding incremental ways to get to 25, 26, and 30. If you come out and do 12, that's still a pretty strong first month (would have felt pretty bad if your goal was more than double that, though.) You are already above average, and now you can learn a lot from those top guys to try to get where they are faster than they did. Then you became the guy that people are basing their goals on, and you are basing your own goals on simply getting better month after month and year after year.
So many problems with this. I don't think you can have 167 tips for anything, even sex, without contradicting yourself somewhere along the way. If a salesperson spends to reading, let alone trying to implement, 167 different actions, there is no way he will have time to actually accomplish anything.
We've all heard the top eight tips golden rules for goal-setting, and with just these few tips you can be a higher achiever than the masses. If you are new to sales let me run through them for you really quick.
1) Write Goals Down
2) Make Goals Attainable
3) Make Goals Challenging
4) Look At Goals Daily
5) Prioritize Goals
6) Make An Action Plan
7) Track & Adjust Action Taken Toward Reaching Goals
8) Celebrate Milestones
I think these are minimum requirements for good goal-setting, but you are not 159 tips from really getting it right. I have adopted two higher level habits in regards to my goal-setting that only help me reach my goals more often, but make it almost impossible for me to not at least come extremely close to hitting them time after time. These two habits have worked for me with both business and personal goals.
1) Share Your Goals With Other People
This one is not as easy as it sounds, which is why it is so effect. When you set a goal, it must be based on your situation, your skill, and your true desires. Otherwise, it will not succeed. That being the case, when it comes time to share your goals with a co-worker, boss, or someone in your personal life - whoever you believe will support you and hold you accountable the goal - there can be lots of fear that they may not believe in your goals. I have had plenty of people in my life who have told my goals were too far-reaching, told me I was a dreamer and need to come back down to reality. There is always the fear, too, that someone who understands your industry and your end-game will believe your goals are too small, that what you are trying to achieve is meaningless. All of this feedback can be helpful, but the key is finding someone who believes in your goals the same way you do and will not let you come up short on them. If I tell my wife that my goal is to make $100,000 in a year, she will never say out loud that she is disappointed in me if I only made $4,000 in a given month, but you can sure as hell bet that I would be ashamed for her to find out that I didn't even reach have of the goal I set for the month. Having someone who truly understands the process behind reaching goals in your industry can be vitally important to tracking goals along the way. For many of you that is going to be a co-worker or a boss, but for me that is my wife as well. She has learned the ideas behind how I set and track my goals, using a formula that basically says whatever I have out through the end of the day on the 19th day of a 31-day month, I should be able to double. If on the morning of the 20th, I tell her I have 11 cars out, she knows I'm right on pace for 22 cars. She also knows that if I have 15 cars on the board by the 20th that I may hit my goal early and we might be able to have a family day at the end of the month if I'm not busy with a last-minute push. These kid of interaction has been a huge key to my success the last 3 years.
2) Base Your Goals On Past Performance
If you have been in your position, and in generally your industry, for a while, it is pretty easy to track month-to-month progress and year-over-year progress. I fully subscribe to the idea that if you are not moving forward you are falling behind. If you sold last 12 cars last December, it is your responsibility to find some way to sell even one more this December. Do that every month, and you are likely looking at giving yourself an easy $4,000 ranger year-over-year.
If you are new to sales, your industry, or your company, there are still ways to figure this out. Take a look at current performance in your dealership. If the average salesperson is selling 10 cars, and the top guy in the place is selling 25, it is highly unlikely that you are going to jump right in and sell 30 cars a month. To make that a goal can lead to a very discouraging start. That's not to say don't try to sell 30, but the right goal is based off of past performance so if you want to be bold enough to say that you are going to go right in and be the top guy and sell 26 cars go for it, but I would typically look at a situation where 12 guys are averaging 10 cars a month and so OK, that's 120 cars per month. 120/13 is 9.23 so I likely set my initial goal at around 11. In a case like my current dealership starts paying bonuses at 13 units, I probably make that my goal. If you come right out and do 17, you know you are on the right track and start finding incremental ways to get to 25, 26, and 30. If you come out and do 12, that's still a pretty strong first month (would have felt pretty bad if your goal was more than double that, though.) You are already above average, and now you can learn a lot from those top guys to try to get where they are faster than they did. Then you became the guy that people are basing their goals on, and you are basing your own goals on simply getting better month after month and year after year.